I’ve been a fan of Real Time with Bill Maher, and have watched every episode, since it began in 2003. Tonight may be the last.
Bari Weiss, who has made a career out of making sure that no one is ever allowed to have the wrong thoughts about Israel and Palestine (e.g., that the State of Israel or its current government is in any way fallible), will be on Real Time tonight, to make a victim of herself vis-à-vis her recent, well-covered, ostentatious departure from The New York Times.
This guest (who has done the show before), and this subject, is prime real-estate for what purported liberal ally Maher and his HBO show have turned into over the last few years, a non-stop finger-wagging rhetorical assault on the [largely imaginary] “extreme left” and its [anecdotal at best] obnoxious behavior (for which, apparently, the national Democratic Party is responsible), particularly the [largely imaginary] “cancel culture” that it’s foisted on all those helpless, defenseless, powerless public figures about whom bad things are being said. Maher’s indulgence of Andrew Sullivan’s proxy-martyr routine on June 19, the most recent show, was shameful:
Maher just sat there like a potted plant while Sullivan spent practically his entire talking time complaining and concern trolling about how awful the imaginary over-the-top caricatures of left-wing liberals who exist only in the annals of conservative fan fiction and in his own head are behaving these days, exerting inordinate amounts of power and influence over everyone and everything, and how very very bad that is for democracy and for America and especially the Democratic Party.
So was his appearance on Morning Joe last September:
What we really don’t need is enablers like Bill Maher signaling to the public that it’s OK, perfectly reasonable and acceptable, indeed to be expected, that you will vote against your own interests and the interests of the country and elect these vicious, greedy, lying corporate tools whose sole mission in life is to make sure their wealthy owners are never held accountable for the harm they cause to you, your family, your neighbors, your co-workers and your environment, while occasionally brutalizing some brown or gay people just for the sport of keeping their ignorant goober base energized, if you find campus liberals that you occasionally hear about to be rather “fragile” and annoying.
I first started having real reservations about continuing to watch Real Time over a year ago:
I’ve been increasingly disturbed lately at how hard he’s been working to burnish his Both Siderist bona fides by “going after” liberals, Democrats and the Left for, mainly, being just so darned annoying that people just can’t help but vote for a demented racist gangster and his perfidious, power-mad political party and its vicious, cruel, ruinous governing agenda.
Now, with another poster-child for this [largely imaginary] left-wing “cancel culture” teed up to be a guest on tonight’s show, I have very little hope that the pattern set forth in the diaries linked above is about to break. I’m practically dreading watching the show because I think I’ll probably shout myself hoarse at whatever bullshit from the guest goes unchallenged by the host. Of course, I’ll be happy to come back tomorrow with a new diary about how Bill proved me wrong and broke out of his Both-Siderist death spiral, but I don’t think he will. And if he doesn’t, I’m sad to say that after 17 years, I don’t think I’ll be able to watch his show again.
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UPDATE: Watching the show now. Weiss is on the “panel” with Thomas Chatterton Williams. Maher invites each to state their “gripes” about “cancel culture.” They’re talking about some “letter” in Harper’s that a whole bunch of liberals supposedly “signed.” Weiss says (paraphrasing) that this “growing culture of illiberalism is different from criticism.” It’s about punishment, it’s about “social murder.” She says that politics has supplanted religion as a part of people’s identity, and impure thoughts are treated as heresy. Maher says that people are afraid to say what they really think, then rattles off examples of people (professors, &c.) being investigated, fired, &c. No mention yet of Weiss’s past efforts to investigate and fire professors who had the wrong thoughts about Israel-Palestine.
Now, to Weiss’s resignation; Jim Jordan quoted Weiss’s letter, thus making this an issue that’s good for Republicans. Maher (of course) agrees. Weiss is glad the big tech company heads agree with her, but says the New York Times has been decimated because of their product. Writers & editors have to be brave & thick-skinned & fearless, but when you’re in fear of online mob, all it takes is a few people to tweet lies about you, for that lie to become true. Her boss was fired for running the Tom Cotton Op-Ed; she doesn’t want to live in a world where the Tom Cottons of the world “can’t be heard in the paper of record.”
Still no mention of Weiss’s history of canceling people who have the wrong thoughts about Israel-Palestine, or whether she wants to live in a world where those with thoughts on that subject that differ from hers can’t be heard.
Williams, Weiss and Maher then take turns setting up strawmen on the issue of race. Weiss complains about people being guilty because of the deeds of their ancestors, then purports to speak for the “victims of cancel culture who aren’t famous.” Tells the story of a bakery/restaurant owner whose daughter put up some horrible, racist and anti-Semitic tweets when she was a teenager; when the tweets were discovered, “all of his accounts were cancelled” (e.g., Costco and Sam’s Club), his business was kicked out of the building by the landlord, he’s afraid he’s going to go bankrupt. He apologized, agreed to anti-racism training, &c., none of it was enough. Maher says that’s an extreme example (expresses no doubt that it’s true exactly as she described it), but then says “extreme examples” like this are common. “Who are these perfect people?” he asks.
Maher asks a good question: if “most people,” “including most liberals,” “don't like this atmosphere,” i.e., that people are afraid to speak out because they’re afraid of the ramifications (as Weiss put it), then “who has this power, and how can they exert it so fully?” Of course no one can answer, beyond vague references to a golem called “the Twitter mob.” Which really brings the whole thing full circle, if you think about it; people like Maher, and Weiss, complain about “cancel culture" being a form of thought control, but looking for ways to make it go away is also a form of thought control. Can one complain about not being allowed to say what you want to say, and at the same time insist that if what you want to say is “I don’t like what you said,” you shouldn’t be allowed to say that?
Not as bad as it could have been.